FREED after 14 years behind bars, Andrew Adams must wait a little longer to see if he’s won a £1m compensation battle.

Mr Adams was locked up for 14 years for a murder he has always maintained he did not commit.

And three judges at the Court of Appeal were told he was released after evidence emerged which had been missed by his original defence team.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw has refused his bid for compensation because his conviction was not quashed on the basis of new evidence, and it had not been shown there was a miscarriage of justice.

Tim Owen QC, representing Mr Adams at the appeal hearing, said: “The appellant cannot be blamed for the incompetence of the legal preparation for his trial.”

He said the facts which led to his conviction being overturned were new to Mr Adams and should fall within the area which allowed him compensation.

Mr Adams, formerly of Chapel Park, Newcastle, and now living in the city’s West End, was 23 when he was found guilty in May 1993 of the shotgun murder of ex-science teacher Jack Royal.

Mr Royal, 58, was gunned down on his doorstep in Sunniside, Gateshead, in 1991, and Mr Adams was jailed for life.

He was the second man to be charged and cleared of the murder. Detectives had also arrested a 19-year-old man called Walter Hepple, although he was cleared by a jury at Newcastle Crown Court.

Mr Royal is believed to have been the victim of a revenge attack.

Three years before his murder he stabbed local scrap dealer David Thompson to death in a fight outside a Chinese takeaway.

Mr Royal claimed he was acting in self-defence and was cleared by a jury, but after that day many people believed he was a marked man.

Lawyers representing other people denied compensation, are watching Mr Adams’ case, which hinges on whether “miscarriage of justice“ means his conviction was quashed on the basis that he was clearly innocent or the phrase refers to a serious flaw in the trial.

Lords Justices Waller, Dyson and Lloyd reserved their rulings to a later date.